Bill Said:

Who would you hire to help in a physical therapy Business.?

We Answered:

First off let's assume your going to specialize in outpatient sports medicine in your physical therapy (PT) business.

Your going to have to know what hours of operation you going to offer and the days of the week.

What is your expected patient volume per day. For the purposes of determining productivity per therapist you should assume 80% of their time is in direct patient care and 20% is not. This 20% covers no shows, continual medical education, calls to and from physicians and payers, vacation, sick time, etc.

Then your going to want to figure what mix of physical therapists you'll need to physical therapist assistants, and aides. Keep in mind the PT is your most expensive patient care employee. By law only a PT can do an evaluation of a patient and develop a care plan. The Physical Therapy Assistant (PTA) can work the plan (basically you want to have PTA do as much of the care plan as possible. Physical Therapy Aides (or Aides) do more the grunt work of walking patients, assisting in lifts, etc. They are very helpful when your working with more complex patients (someone needing crutches, etc)

You will need front desk coverage (receptionist, scheduling). You will also need a billing person or two (you want redundency in this function because you never want to be without the ability to send out a bill). You will need medical secretaries to handle your medical records or assist in electronic medical records

You will need to have someone be the onsite overall manager. The go to guy/gal for daily operational problems. This should be someone well versed in business.

Of course, you'll need someone who cleans the space. You might be able to have the PT Aides function in both capacities.

I would also have you consider overall space required. Roughly 2,500 of useable floor space should be enough for a busy clinic. Don't forget about the capital equipment for an outpatient therapy business, and the fixed costs of telephone, gas, rent, etc.

Good luck.

Ken Said:

I am starting my own Physical Therapy business and I don't know how to get patients?

We Answered:

You don't get contracts with doctors or patients, you get contracts with insurance companies. Find out who are your big local insurance companies. Medicare, Medicaid, Blue Cross, all the workers compensation carriers etc. Call them and ask them how to become an in-nerwork provider for them. Not hard, just a lot of running around and paperwork to fill out applications. You need to have a REALISTIC idea about your cost to deliver services per visit and overhead. I know that may be hard right now. Don't jump and rush into all the contracts. In some cases it may cost you more to do the therapy than what the insurance company is willing to pay you. Been there, done than - No fun. I often see this when they put a cap on a condition. For example if they pay a max of $1000 for RC repair and you see that person for 30 visits, that leaves you with $33 a visit. When you figure in no shows, cancellations, insurance denials weeks after treatment and deductibles that patients skip out on, that $33 could easily end up being $25 or less.

Only after insurance issues are resolved do you start marketing to your doctors. You will kill your reputation if you have to turn patients away that doctors send you because you can't take their insurance. Been there, done that with a company I worked for. You don't get a second chance to make a first impression.

Marketing to doctors is not always very effective or easy. Depends on your market. In a big city there may be 50 or more PT clinics for doctors to choose from. You won't even get a chance to talk to a doctor about a new start up. In many cases they will have a list of PT clinics for their patients to chose from if their patients are given a choice. See if they will put you on their list. Often they prefer a certain clinic and their patient may not even be given a choice to go see you. In smaller communities, they may have already commited to therapist because they like them. You will have to win them over. Show them that you are better then the competition, it takes time and not always possible.

THE MOST IMPORTANT thing you can do is your market research. Is there a need for a or another PT clinic. If the need is not there you will most certainly fail. Succeding in a small town where the surgeon and the referring doctors are employed by the local hospital will be very difficult. Setting up your clinic in a market where there is demand is by far one of the most important things you can do to succeed.

Hope this helps

Katherine Said:

How to open a physical therapy Business?

We Answered:

There are 4 ways to go about operating a physical therapy business.

1. Must be a physical therapist. You cannot use someone's license, that would be illegal.

2. Must be a medical doctor. Federal law places MD scope of practice above all other medical professionals, therefore they can operate a medical practice and hire PT as staff.

3. Must be an osteopath. Identical rights to MD.

4. Owner of building. You cannot dictate or control any staff. You may rent out space to medical professionals.